Packet vs Circuit Switching

Packet Switching vs Circuit Switching Simulator — Why the Internet Shares Wires

Before packets, networks reserved a whole line for each conversation — and it sat idle most of the time. This simulator lets you compare circuit switching with packet switching on the same wire: reserve lanes and watch capacity go to waste, or interleave packets and fit many more users through statistical multiplexing. Push the traffic up and you'll find the congestion cliff, exactly the trade-off explored in the NET DIVE video series.

What you can do in this simulation

• Toggle between circuit switching (reserved lanes) and packet switching (interleaved packets)
• Watch the shared wire fill with colour-coded packets and see idle time as wasted capacity
• Adjust the number of users and how bursty each one is, and read live link utilization
• See how statistical multiplexing lets one wire serve several times more users
• Raise the load until the queue turns red — the congestion cliff where delay explodes

Concepts covered

packet switching · circuit switching · statistical multiplexing · link utilization · congestion · bandwidth · store and forward · networking fundamentals

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